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Wednesday, November 30, 2005

The next obvious step was a 15in-gun battlecruiser with 12in armour. I continued the practice of reducing dimensions to obtain greater strength. I had to increase the beam due to stability and recoil issues. I kept the soft ends and a thicker lower belt and thinner upper belt. This is sort of a more heavily armed and armoured Renown. I also settled for a lower speed to keep the size reasonable. The secondary armament is transitional, with twin 4in QF mounts. This is the Springsharp report:

Tuesday, November 29, 2005

The natural thing is to have a 1911 British battlecruiser that is better protected. The design is Tiger-like, except for the soft ends. For better or worse, I am using reduced dimensions, as that increases the "composite strength" in Springsharp. I thought that this design needed to be 28 knots, at least, so that ballooned the displacement by 1,000 tons. This is the Springsharp report:

Monday, November 28, 2005

Perhaps using oil-fired boilers on a British capital ship in 1909 is "cheating", but having them allows for a very potent ship. This is a small-dimension battlecruiser with 8-13.5 guns with the superfiring guns aft. The lower belt, barbettes, and turret faces are 11in thick. The deck is 3in with a 2in torpedo bulkhead. This design is much more capable than the Lion class, but probably only is due to the oil-fired boilers. I also omit armour at the ends, as the unarmoured length is relatively small. This is the Springsharp report:

When you look at just how bad the Indefatigable design was, especially compared to the Jane's Fighting Ships entry, you wonder why they couldn't have done better. I tried my hand at such a better design. I wanted the 9in belt and a 3in deck, in this case, along with a decent speed. My design relies on one turret being superfiring aft, and on oil-fired boilers, a big stretch. This is the Springsharp report:

Sunday, November 27, 2005

Now, let us see what might be done for a well-protected British battlecruiser for 1906, as an alternative to the Invincibles, but still a cruiser, not a fast battleship. This version is rather strange, as the dimensions are reduced to achieve adequate strength without ballooning the displacement unnecessarily. Part of the strangeness is that this version embraces the 25.5 knot speed, rather than 25 knots. The 25.5 knot speed was a feature of some design studies during the 1906-1908 period, and we are using that for this design. "Better protection" means a 9in belt. This design abandons the 16ft high thick belt for a thicker lower belt and a thinner upper belt, again to keep the displacement from undue increases. One of the two 12in gun turrets aft is superfiring. All turrets are on the centerline, with one amidships, although you would not necessarily know it from the Springsharp report:

Saturday, November 26, 2005

Last night, I designed the ultimate ship in the series of British fast battleships from 1905 to 1923. This ship is very compact in dimensions but has a full form, to achieve adequate strength. The speed is a modest 28 knots (faster than the Yamatos) and the armament is 9-18in, 16-6in, 6-4.7in AA, and 36-2pdr AA guns. The armour basis is 15in. The deck is a thick 8in. The ship seems to be small for the capabilities, so I wonder if there is some flaw that I am not seeing. This is the Springsharp report:

Friday, November 25, 2005

Continuing the current British fast battleship series is the 1919 version. The British considered 16.5in guns and I have adopted them. 16in guns were too small for that date, considering that larger guns were being actively developed. I had wanted 29 knots for this ship, but the size increase was greater than I wanted to have. I settled for a 28-knot ship with 9-16.5in BLR, 16-6in QF, 6-4.7in AA, and 36-2pdr AA guns. The armour basis is 14in. The deck is a respectable 6in. The torpedo bulkhead is a robust 4in. The hull is flush-decked and has a transom stern. This is the Springsharp report:

Jumping back to my series of British fast battleships, I designed a 16in-gunned version for 1916. This is attempting to fit into that series, and uses a secondary armament of 5.5in QF guns with a main battery of 16in BLR. The armour basis is 13in. The result is almost a battlecruiser or a fast battleship reminiscent of the late 1930's. The layout is conservative, with four twin turrets for the 16in guns. The 5.5in guns would be in shields and mounted high (upper deck and superstructure). As usual, I have retained a 16ft high belt of the maximum thickness, unlike the usual practice of having a thick lower belt and a thinner upper belt. There is no "upper deck side" armour, either. The deck is 4in thick, and hopefully that would suffice. The torpedo bulkhead is 3in thick, which is substantial for the period. The speed is 27.5 knots with a 6,200nm range at a cruising speed of 17 knots. This is the Springsharp report:

Thursday, November 24, 2005

We seem to be on a roll, so let us try the 15in-gunned fast battleship to be laid down in 1913. By accepting slightly lower protection than we might otherwise have, we have a 27-knot ship with a 17 knot cruising speed and a 5,600nm range. The armour basis is 12in, which should do quite well for a WWI-style ship. I actually reduced length and beam to achieve adequate composite strength. I also have lowered the freeboard for that same end. Does this seem reasonable and useful? This is the Springsharp report:

I tried a 13.5in-gunned fast battleship in the alternate design series tradition (fewer guns) and I was pleased with the result. Except for having much better protection, the design is very battlecruiser-like. The speed in at least acceptable at 26.5 knots. The cruising speed is higher at 15 knots for a longer range of 5,200 nm. The armour basis is 11in. The machinery is only helped by using all-oil fired boilers but otherwise is not lightweight. This is the Springsharp report:

This design is somewhat reminiscent of actual plans for a fast battleship shortly after the dreadnought was built. I wanted 25.5 knots and 8-12in guns. The belt is 10in, which is better than most battlecruisers built by the British. The design is much more potent than the sad little Invincibles with a 6in belt. The deck armour is light, but that does not seem to have had too much affect on the survivability in Springsharp. This is the Springsharp report:

Wednesday, November 23, 2005

I believe that my battleship design in the series that is lost, perhaps permanently, included a feature where the guns, even in 1905, were on the centerline, but there were only four turrets, not five. I tried this approach for a 1905 British battleship. There is nothing special here, except that the belt is 16ft high and there are the four turrets, with one superfiring over the other at the stern. If the boilers were oil-fired, the ship could be rather fast. I tried this, in fact, and with no other changes, 22.5 knots could be reached with oil-fired boilers. This is the Springsharp report:

Tuesday, November 22, 2005

By reducing the gratuitous extra length from the armour belt and thinning it to 8in, I was able to get 37 knots from my "cruiser killer" design (GB/CB/1923). Of course, the design is only possible because of using the lightest weight machinery (41.8 SHP/ton). So you have a fast ship with 9-14in BLR, 16-5.5in QF, 6-4.7in AA, and 36-2pdr AA. This is the revised Springsharp report:

Monday, November 21, 2005

Frank Fox calls this sort of ship a "cruiser killer". That is how he describes the Alaska class, which is one of his favorite ship designs. I tried my hand again at a very fast armoured cruiser, and given that the design has 14in guns, we would be destined to call the design a battlecruiser. I wanted at least 36 knots, and I was able to achieve 36.5 knots. the armour belt is 9in, which should be sufficient to protect against the lesser cruisers. Those who have been following my string of designs may recognize this as being reminiscent of a design I did in the summer of 2001. This is the Springsharp report:

I found out quickly that to achieve a reasonable 1905 British armoured cruiser, we needed to use lighter machinery than 12 SHP/ton of machinery. In the real world, the Invincibles had somewhat lighter machinery than that (although only 12.44 SHP/ton). The problem is partly that my armour weight is 4,672 tons while the Invincibles had just 3,460 tons of armour. This is the Springsharp report:

Sunday, November 20, 2005

I thought that I would try a design in Springsharp that would be similar to what my alternate history series. I did a design for a Japanese armoured cruiser with a 25 knot speed, 6in belt, and 8-8in guns. The ship underperforms, possibly from the armouring scheme. The fact that coal-fired boilers are used is probably a large factor. The main armament would be in echelon. This is the Springsharp report:

Starting in early 1976, I did a series of drawings, with specifications, for an alternate history naval building race and the start of a war. I have not been able to find the drawings, but I am holding out hope that it might still exist in storage. The scenario started from 1905 and continued up through 1914. I actually continued filling in gaps and continuing the timeline into the latter 1970's. The focus was on a competition between Great Britain and Japan. They both were building fleets with dreadnought battleships, medium caliber-armed armoured cruisers, light cruisers, destroyers, submarines, and eventually, aviation (I believe). I also had fleets for the neutral nations, which included the United States and Germany. The United States had one particularly nice light cruiser design from somewhere in the 1912-1914 timeframe, armed with 5in QF guns and torpedo tubes. On the outbreak of war, the action took place in the seas around Indonesia and the Philippines.

Saturday, November 19, 2005

Keeping in the Italian design mode (except for the British), I went to a larger design (something like the Duca d'Aosta). My design is underperforming because of the limitations of Springsharp. I cannot obtain light enough machinery to be equal the real world performance. My ship has 8-6in QF, 4-4in AA, and 16-40mm AA guns with 6-21in TT and a speed of 36 knots. My ship only has a belt of 2in and a deck of 1in. This is the Springsharp report:

Friday, November 18, 2005

I failed at achieving 36.5 knots, but I was able to add more protection, partly by reducing some, so that I could have a 1in belt that covers a good bit of side. The range is less, but this seemed to be an improvement. Adding the belt improved seakeeping! This is the Springsharp report:

I thought that a Barbiano-style light cruiser. The problem with my first attempt is that there is no belt, only turret, barbette, deck, and conning tower. My first attempt was to reach 36 knots with 8-6in guns. That goal proved achievable. I wanted a 555ft length and as low a displacement as possible. I assumed that a relatively high freeboard would be required. I also assumed that the design would use the lightest machinery that Springsharp would allow. I expect that I will do several iterations to achieve better performance. This is the Springsharp report:

Thursday, November 17, 2005

To get the benefit of destroyer-like composite strength assessment, I seemed to need to keep a scout cruiser below 4,000 tons normal displacement. I tried varying displacement and draft to see if I could squeeze out just a little more. I reduced freeboard, as I seemed to have adequate seakeeping capability. I was able to get a range of 4,200 nm and a maximum speed of 39 knots. That is with 6-5.5in, 8-57mm, 12-40mm, and 8-21in TT. It is only a marginal gain, but it still is nice. This is yet another Springsharp report:

I took another try at the scout cruiser to see if I could get better performance than I had. I wanted to see if I could use 6-5.5in guns, with the same LAA armament: 8-57mm in twin mounts, and 12-40mm in twin mounts. The torpedo armament is still 8-21in TT. I was able to reach 38.75 knots, although I derated the range to 4,000 nm. This is the Springsharp report:

Springsharp let me achieve a better high-speed scout by going to a smaller displacement. That way, I was able to get a 38 knot maximum speed with a 15 knot cruising speed. The armament is 6-13cm DP guns, 8-57mm AA, and 12-40mm AA guns with 8-21in TT. There is no protection. This allows a better ship to be designed on a normal displacement of 3,450 tons. This is more of a super destroyer, which was what was intended, anyway. This is the Springsharp report:

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

I tried designing a very fast scout for the British in 1921, but the result was very unsatisfactory and disappointing. The issue seems to be the usual. The machinery weight is too great compared to what could actually be achieved. The freeboard is very high, but I will not accept a low seakeeping ability, so this is what was required to achieve something acceptable. I wanted a lower displacement, but the design had inadequate strength, unless the displacement ballooned. This is the Springsharp report:

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About Me

I spent 11 years on active duty in the navy. Half was as an enlisted man and half as an officer. My Dad had interested me in the navy and ships, when I was young. I found that I was attracted to doing research, regardless of topic, although much of that research has been in the fields of naval and military history. My Dad was also an artist, and got me drawing and painting since I was three. Much of my work consists of portraits of military and naval historical figures, as well as ships and tanks.